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Apple Vision Pro and Software Layoffs
In addition to cutting dozens of Vision Pro employees who worked on features like immersive video and gaming, Apple is laying off people who worked on Siri and AI, reports Bloomberg.
Apple is “largely shutting down” the Vision Pro team focused on gaming, and it is paring down the team that makes immersive video content. Approximately 100 employees who were part of the Vision Products Group have been laid off, with Apple also cutting 100 people from its Siri and software groups.
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Despite the cuts to the Vision Products Group, employees were told that the Vision Pro and visionOS operating system are not being eliminated.
Apple told Bloomberg that it was realigning some teams in order to “evolve” the business to provide the best experience for users. “While we will create new roles as part of this change, it will also impact a limited number of existing roles,” Apple said.
The job cuts are tiny in relation to the overall company, which had 166,000 full time employees in September 2025 (the last time Apple disclosed its headcount). But as John Ternus prepares to take the CEO job just over one week from now, the timing seems designed to get some unpleasant work out of the way and let the new boss come in with clean hands.
It’s hard to find good people, Apple has plenty of work that needs doing, and it just reported a record quarter. Maybe they don’t need more immersive video content, but it’s not clear to me why the other employees couldn’t be reassigned. And I’m really wondering what’s going on with the general software group, where they’re getting rid of legends like Keith Stattenfield:
So, I posted yesterday on an another place that I had been just laid off at Apple after 37 years. ( Surprise! I got laid off. It was unexpected. I am still coming to terms with it. Yes, I will be ok. ) And I mentioned some of the things I’d done, and mused that I’d thought I’d finish out my career in a few years having passed along the knowledge to younger engineers. Alas, that’s going to get left unfinished.
I felt much the same way, because I’d also hoped to slowly ease into retirement instead of being given options that led me to retire a few years early.
Laying off anyone working on anything related to Apple Vision Pro is a gross strategic blunder, because it signals a lack of confidence in the product. Put them to work fixing bug backlogs if you don’t want them working on what they were doing, but don’t lay them off and let that show up in the press, that’s fucking amateur hour shit.
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And the same goes for the Software Engineering layoffs, which don’t seem to be reported much upon because the layoffs have been described as “Apple Vision Pro, Siri, and software” where perhaps people don’t get that the latter is how Apple refers to the Software Engineering (SWE) org. There are so many bugs that should be fixed, that users encounter in their everyday lives, just reassign people to work on them. It’s stupid to lay people off when they could do that.
Plus, maybe retaining that institutional knowledge would help forestall future bugs.
Previously:
- Apple’s Q3 2026 Results
- Giving Up on the Vision Pro
- John Ternus Replaces Tim Cook
- AI Layoffs
- Why Apple Still Hasn’t Cracked AI
- Apple Shifts Siri From Giannandrea to Rockwell
- Apple Books Layoffs
- Apple Cancels Car Project
- Thank You, Sal
Update (2026-08-25): Louie Mantia:
Laying off employees who were working on a product that largely “failed” in the market is extremely hurtful to those employees, because the product’s failure is not their fault. They were directed to do that work. Apple should find new places for every single one of the employees who worked on Vision Pro. They owe it to the people who they directed to work toward the goal of making and maintaining Vision Pro. They can afford to do that.
Apple didn’t even work that hard to take care of the iPod employees who were once half the company’s revenue. In the end they basically gave Nest a free engineering team.
Update (2026-08-28): See also: ArsTechnica.
Update (2026-09-02): Hartley Charlton:
Recent layoffs of Apple employees working on the Vision Pro were broader than previously thought, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports.
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Gurman reports that people inside the Vision Pro group have spent months lobbying new CEO John Ternus to stay the course on the platform even as sales continue to underwhelm. Colleagues who have discussed the headset with Ternus say he was skeptical of it from the start, seeing it as too bulky and too costly to reach a mass audience.
Interestingly, since visionOS apparently runs on Apple’s upcoming smart glasses, the wider layoffs impact software shared across both product lines rather than the headset alone.
I was recently informed that I am being laid off from my position at Apple. It was unexpected, especially coming right after WWDC, where several of the projects I led and features I contributed to were announced.
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You can find my resume here.
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